Published 4:00 am, Wednesday, May 3, 1995

In blood-soaked Rwanda, traumatized by last year's genocide of 500,000 people and accusations of a recent new massacre of thousands of Hutu refugees, the proceedings against its own soldiers were an attempt by the government to restore faith in the country's justice system and respect for human rights.

The 9-month-old government is anxious to convince the world that it is serious about rebuilding its justice system. It has been warned by the international community that desperately needed aid will be cut if human rights are not respected.

The issue is especially sensitive because of the slayings of hundreds of Hutus by Rwandan soldiers at the Kibeho refugee camp April 22 and the subsequent accusations of a coverup. The United Nations says at least 2,000 people died. The government insists that the number was only about 300.

The deaths caused a wave of international criticism. Belgium and the Netherlands suspended nonhumanitarian aid, and the European Union is reviewing its aid program.

Neither case in the spartan courthouse yesterday dealt with the 1994 genocide by Hutu extremists that wiped out hundreds of thousands of Tutsis or the alleged scattered incidents since then of Tutsi soldiers taking revenge.

In the first case, a captain and five soldiers are charged with invading and robbing the Tanzanian Embassy in Kigali in October, killing two of its civilian guards.

In the second, five soldiers are accused of a murder-for-hire in which a powerful local businessman was abducted and strangled to death at the behest of a business rival who has since fled Rwanda.

The men all face execution by firing

squad if convicted by a six-judge military panel.

Presiding Judge Charles Kayonga, a former guerrilla commander whose only previous judicial experience was disciplining soldiers in the field, said a verdict will be reached as early as Friday.

Nkibito said about 500 Rwandan soldiers are jailed awaiting trial for crimes against the civilian population.

That is a small number compared with the more than 30,000 Hutus languishing in dirty, overcrowded prisons waiting to be tried on charges of participating in the genocide of Tutsis and moderate Hutus between April and June last year.

An initial trial symbolically opened on April 6, the anniversary of the beginning of the killings, but has been quietly adjourned until the justice system is ready to cope.